The Legacy of Saint Brendan: A History of the Western Hemisphere, 512 to 1400
- Thread starter Rognvald
- Start date
-
- Tags
- americas dark ages exploration
I haven't been able to respond for a while, due to being on a camping trip to the Montana Mountains with some friends for a week, but this timeline keeps getting better and better. Also, I love that you are bringing in Himyar and Yemen into the timeline, even if only tangently (I had a few chapters dealing with the rise of the Himyar Kingdom in my Amalingian timeline as well, and it was a lot of fun to write).
I was wondering what sources you are using for early Medieval Irish society and history, by chance? In my own timeline, the Irish are going through a bit of a mini-Viking era (happily hiring themselves out as mercenaries to the larger powers, raiding Gaul and Hispania, and trading, etc) and my next few chapters are going to focus on them in even more detail. I'd love to see what you're using and buttress up my own knowledge a bit before I delve in-depth.
Also; poor Dal Raite
Hopefully Pictland still ends up Gaelic in this timeline!
I was wondering what sources you are using for early Medieval Irish society and history, by chance? In my own timeline, the Irish are going through a bit of a mini-Viking era (happily hiring themselves out as mercenaries to the larger powers, raiding Gaul and Hispania, and trading, etc) and my next few chapters are going to focus on them in even more detail. I'd love to see what you're using and buttress up my own knowledge a bit before I delve in-depth.
Also; poor Dal Raite
Hopefully Pictland still ends up Gaelic in this timeline!
In our history the Icelandic medieval chronicler Ari Thorgilsson claimed that when the first Norse arrived in Iceland there were already Irish monks living there. Some interpretations of Brendan's story indicate that Iceland may have had Irish monks in residence already in this period.
In this timeline I'd be surprised if there wasn't at least modest Irish settlements. It's a nice enough place and importantly it's the best stopover point between Ireland and the Americas, especially with the technology and seasonal routes discussed. It'll be a while before they're established but as trade increases there's money to be made and not everybody can or will want to go the whole route since a round trip can take almost a year. Iceland is going to be a prime trading hub centuries before the vikings arrive on the scene.
Edit: I found a translation of Thorgilsson's history. Obviously a few hundred years after our POD but very interesting. In our history there were at least a noticeable number of Irish on the islands when the Norse arrived. It also describes an Iceland that's very different from today with plentiful forests:
Iceland was first settled from Norway in the days of Haraldr inn hárfagri [the handsome-hair], son of Hálfdan inn svarti [=the black], at that time—according to the reckoning and telling of Teitr, my foster- father, the person whom I consider wisest, son of Bishop Ísleifr; and of Þorkell, my uncle, son of Gellir, who remembered far back; and Þuríðr daughter of Snorri the Chieftain, who was both very wise and not unreliable—when Ívarr son of Ragnarr loðbrókar [hairy-trousers] had Saint Eadmund, king of the English, killed. And that was eight hundred and seventy winters after the birth of Christ, as is written in his [Eadmund’s] saga.
There was a Norwegian called Ingólfr, of whom it is said truthfully that he was the first to travel from there to Iceland—when Haraldr inn hárfagri was sixteen years old, and on another occasion a few years later. He lived to the south in Reykjavík. Where Ingólfr first made landfall, to the east of Minþakseyri, is called Ingólfshöfði, but where he established his own property, to the west of Ölfossá, is called Ingólfsfell.
At that time, Iceland had woods growing between the mountains and the shore. Christians were here then, whom Scandinavians [Norðmenn] call Papar, but then they left, because they did not want to be here alongside heathen people. They left Irish books, bells and croziers, from which one can tell that they were Irishmen.
Last edited:
Quiver: Talbeáh
Why is Talbeáh referred to as such? Where did the name come from?
INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY AT HÆSTINGAS TERMINAL 2 ANSWERS:
Talbeáh is a combined, shortened, and mutated form of the Gaelic translation of the term “Terra Ursus”, which is “Bear Land” or “Land of Bears”, depending on which Latin translation you read.
That term came from the Peace of Armagh, which was negotiated by the Irish Bishop of Armagh in the 7th Century. The Fánaithe, or early Irish explorers/fur-trappers, had been trading with native peoples on the mainland for some time from their bases on Blessed Isle. They had a million different terms for this land, and the Bishop of Armagh didn’t want to pick any of those because he thought they were all too smutty. For reals. So he instead asked what the land was like, and all the Fánaithe said “there’s a lot of bears”. So he had his scribe start calling it Terra Ursus.
Well the Fánaithe didn’t speak Latin mostly, so that quickly was translated to Irish, and then evolved into Talbeáh, still basically meaning “Land of Bears”.
Last edited:
I’m personally looking forward to reading about explorers going south down the coast and discovering the Maritimes and eventually New England.
Or down the St.Lawrence. But I don't think there is enough interest yet..or demand for furs.
markus meecham
Banned
I imagine there's still an abundance of fur in northern/northeastern europe, so while terra ursus is a sizeable source of income for petty kings, there is not much of a demand yet...but there are many factors that are not economic, namely drunk irishmen looking for a good adventure, a good fight and women.
Hm. Iceland keeps its forests (longer and/or partially. Has areas with Irish settlements started by travellers recognizing the use of a friendly port on the way over the Atlantic, one that's easy to get to using prevailing winds and currents. Grows from there.
But maybe some Norse settlements too as time goes. Since Ireland will probably be a bit stronger it'll resist the Norse better - so Iceland will be where the cultures mix.
Greenland...
With Bearland already open for colonization will anyone actually colonize Greenland? I think not. But having some go there in summer for the specialty furs etc available? Yes. Polarbear furs and narwhal teeth could net you nice coins.
The names were given by the Norse, so need to change.
Iceland has several names at first, but when the volcanoes are discovered, then whatever is old Irish for Big Volcano Island sticks. (Small volcano island being Heimaey).
And so Greenland gets to be Iceland like it should.
Can we get a surviving Pictland somehow? At least part of Scotland stays Pictish?
Last edited:
Chapter Three, Part One: The “Flood”
Chapter Three, Part One: The “Flood”, 700-750
The period kicked off by the arrival of the first family to the Insula has, traditionally, been seen as a revolutionary moment, a critical point in history. Expressed most famously in 1902 by Volkert Smied in his seminal work The Conquest of the West, this idea holds that the sluice gate was open and that Gaels from across Ireland flooded into the West. Almost immediately after their arrival, the land was tamed and the settlers constructed towns and cities and roads.
Needless to say, this idea has been revisited by later scholars and most agree the Smied and his disciples were too invested in later textual accounts, such as The Annals of Rinneen which were almost certainly compiled in the 14th century (albeit claiming an earlier heritage). Most historians now agree that the idea of the New World being flooded with immigrants from Ireland in the 8th century is not accurate at all.
In fact, for the first half-century, the immigration had seemingly small impacts on the way life was conducted in the Insula and Terra Ursus. However, these minor changes would create an avalanche of sorts over time, eventually having major effects on the fate of the Bay of Saint Peter.
Settlement in this period was carried out by veteran Fánaithe and their families from Ireland, fleeing the violence and disease of the Streachailt for the “safer” life in the New World. While the dangers of the journey to the New World, as discussed earlier in this work, were many at this point in time, the Fánaithe who departed viewed a possible death by shipwreck better than the agonizing spasms and painful sores of the Leontine Plague. [1]
The numbers in this first wave of settlement are smaller than most earlier historians thought. In all likelihood, in the most intensive period of Fánaithe migration (700 – 750), there were between two-hundred and three-hundred individuals who arrived in the New World (not counting the hundred or so who failed to arrive due to a variety of reasons). While this number seem small, it brought the European and European influenced population of the West to well over fifteen-hundred, with the majority of course still being Measctha.
The Bishop of Tairngire for the majority of this period, the Abbot Tadc, saw this migration as a blessing and as a curse. He knew that the Fánaithe had a general disdain for the temporal authority granted to the Bishop, but he felt that the arrival of women and children would cut down on the general immorality the Fánaithe were known for. He did his best to mobilize the resources available to him to help these new arrivals.
Most of the Fánaithe and their families, however, did not stay long on the Insula. Memories and reports of the lands to the south, along the Bay of Saint Peter, held that this territory was much more conducive to farming and greater settlement. Therefore, most Fánaithe only spent a short time on the Insula before departing for the mainland of Terra Ursus, aiming for one of the small permanent camps established during the late Heroic age.
Accompanying them in these voyages were families of Measctha. The idea of land where one could raise real food, and not live off of turnip mash and salted fish, encouraged many to join their newly arriving kindred in their settlement. This was encouraged by Tadc, who, like his predecessors, viewed the Measctha as a way to spread the authority of the Bishopric.
This would lead to the development of several small settlements along the southern coast of the Bay of Saint Peter, which shifted the character of camps such as Three Pines to more permanent character. Three Pines, for example, underwent a name change, becoming known as Cósta Dhearg, or Red Coast, becoming the largest European settlement beyond Peace Town, boasting a population of some two-hundred and fifty souls in 750.
Economically, these new settlements simply picked up where the Fánaithe left off, collecting the furs and other trade goods for shipment to Ireland. The shipments, of course, were smaller as demand for such luxury items as furs from the New World declined. Instead a new industry began to take over, based out of Peace Town- fish salting. Salted cod, collected from the vast reserves off the coast of the Insula, could stay preserved for a long time; for an Ireland still wracked by the fallout from the Streachailt, it was a Godsend.
Another interesting aspect of this early colonization was the continued influence of the Companies. While they started as business endeavors, they had developed into a sort of mock-clan structure, helping to increase the violence of the High Heroic Period. While many of the Companies dissolved as Fánaithe returned to Ireland to fight, those that came back often held connections with their comrades in arms. Members of the same Company would settle in the same place, cementing the clannish connections.
As European settlement became more developed, these Company divisions would have larger impacts further along the line. But for now, the Fánaithe and their families hunted, trapped, fished, and sowed fields of grain in the more friendly soil of the mainland. And as each season passed and babies were born, the European presence became more and more permanent.
[1]- Of course, not all of the Fánaithe agreed with this, and a number of them stayed in Ireland, leading to the relatively rare modern Irish surname Denafánaí, “Of the wanderer”.
The period kicked off by the arrival of the first family to the Insula has, traditionally, been seen as a revolutionary moment, a critical point in history. Expressed most famously in 1902 by Volkert Smied in his seminal work The Conquest of the West, this idea holds that the sluice gate was open and that Gaels from across Ireland flooded into the West. Almost immediately after their arrival, the land was tamed and the settlers constructed towns and cities and roads.
Needless to say, this idea has been revisited by later scholars and most agree the Smied and his disciples were too invested in later textual accounts, such as The Annals of Rinneen which were almost certainly compiled in the 14th century (albeit claiming an earlier heritage). Most historians now agree that the idea of the New World being flooded with immigrants from Ireland in the 8th century is not accurate at all.
In fact, for the first half-century, the immigration had seemingly small impacts on the way life was conducted in the Insula and Terra Ursus. However, these minor changes would create an avalanche of sorts over time, eventually having major effects on the fate of the Bay of Saint Peter.
Settlement in this period was carried out by veteran Fánaithe and their families from Ireland, fleeing the violence and disease of the Streachailt for the “safer” life in the New World. While the dangers of the journey to the New World, as discussed earlier in this work, were many at this point in time, the Fánaithe who departed viewed a possible death by shipwreck better than the agonizing spasms and painful sores of the Leontine Plague. [1]
The numbers in this first wave of settlement are smaller than most earlier historians thought. In all likelihood, in the most intensive period of Fánaithe migration (700 – 750), there were between two-hundred and three-hundred individuals who arrived in the New World (not counting the hundred or so who failed to arrive due to a variety of reasons). While this number seem small, it brought the European and European influenced population of the West to well over fifteen-hundred, with the majority of course still being Measctha.
The Bishop of Tairngire for the majority of this period, the Abbot Tadc, saw this migration as a blessing and as a curse. He knew that the Fánaithe had a general disdain for the temporal authority granted to the Bishop, but he felt that the arrival of women and children would cut down on the general immorality the Fánaithe were known for. He did his best to mobilize the resources available to him to help these new arrivals.
Most of the Fánaithe and their families, however, did not stay long on the Insula. Memories and reports of the lands to the south, along the Bay of Saint Peter, held that this territory was much more conducive to farming and greater settlement. Therefore, most Fánaithe only spent a short time on the Insula before departing for the mainland of Terra Ursus, aiming for one of the small permanent camps established during the late Heroic age.
Accompanying them in these voyages were families of Measctha. The idea of land where one could raise real food, and not live off of turnip mash and salted fish, encouraged many to join their newly arriving kindred in their settlement. This was encouraged by Tadc, who, like his predecessors, viewed the Measctha as a way to spread the authority of the Bishopric.
This would lead to the development of several small settlements along the southern coast of the Bay of Saint Peter, which shifted the character of camps such as Three Pines to more permanent character. Three Pines, for example, underwent a name change, becoming known as Cósta Dhearg, or Red Coast, becoming the largest European settlement beyond Peace Town, boasting a population of some two-hundred and fifty souls in 750.
Economically, these new settlements simply picked up where the Fánaithe left off, collecting the furs and other trade goods for shipment to Ireland. The shipments, of course, were smaller as demand for such luxury items as furs from the New World declined. Instead a new industry began to take over, based out of Peace Town- fish salting. Salted cod, collected from the vast reserves off the coast of the Insula, could stay preserved for a long time; for an Ireland still wracked by the fallout from the Streachailt, it was a Godsend.
Another interesting aspect of this early colonization was the continued influence of the Companies. While they started as business endeavors, they had developed into a sort of mock-clan structure, helping to increase the violence of the High Heroic Period. While many of the Companies dissolved as Fánaithe returned to Ireland to fight, those that came back often held connections with their comrades in arms. Members of the same Company would settle in the same place, cementing the clannish connections.
As European settlement became more developed, these Company divisions would have larger impacts further along the line. But for now, the Fánaithe and their families hunted, trapped, fished, and sowed fields of grain in the more friendly soil of the mainland. And as each season passed and babies were born, the European presence became more and more permanent.
[1]- Of course, not all of the Fánaithe agreed with this, and a number of them stayed in Ireland, leading to the relatively rare modern Irish surname Denafánaí, “Of the wanderer”.
Last edited:
